About “Pray”

‘Pray’ is the second track to Jay Z’s tenth studio album American Gangster.

In this song Jay Z expresses a semi-biographical narrative, which largely emphasises the context in which he was brought up in: capitalist America and its symptoms – ghettos, poverty, violence and drugs. He explores the impact it had on his community and the impact on him personally, where both are trying to protect themselves from the stain of sin: of getting caught up with the symptoms of society.